they are almost like sandy but in a positive sense. there was a lot of resistance to going along with spending cuts in 2011 and 2012. the political forces dictated that happening based on the elections. the same thing is happening in the inverse way on the republican side. on both issues we talked about at length, fiscal cliff and immigration, the people who lead the republican party, the smart people, except for the ideologues, know that their positions helped create a situation where they lost the election. they are going to have to change. i think we are going to find our republican colleagues more willing to compromise and deal. i think we will find that they realize that obstruction does not work. will there be a group of republicans who are still for obstruction? yes. as i said, they will have less power in 2012. you will see the 2013-2014 session of congress and relations between the white house be considerably better than they were in 2011-2012. that is what i think one of the things the tone of speaker boehner's indicated. --